This archive report was first published on 25 August 2020.
Kenya's forest cover has been depleted at an alarming rate of approximately 5,000 hectares per annum, leading to an annual reduction in freshwater availability of approximately 62 million cubic meters.
Usiku Games, a Kenyan tech start-up, has developed the Seedballs Game to help aid reforestation of Kenya's lost forest cover. The game aims to increase Kenya's forest cover to 10 per cent by 2022, from the current 7 per cent.
Seedballs Kenya, a collaboration between Chardust Ltd and Cookswell Jikos Ltd, has distributed over 10 million seedballs since its inception in 2016. The seedballs are coated tree seeds inside a ball of recycled charcoal dust mixed with some nutritious binders, which helps protect the seed within from predators and extremes of temperature.
According to Teddy Kinyanjui, Co-Founder Seedballs Kenya, the initiative targets areas that have been severely affected by deforestation because of charcoal burning activities. "We are very glad to partner with Usiku Games to drive more awareness on the need to conserve our forests and to regrow the millions of trees we have cut down as a Country over the years," he said.
Players of the game fly a small plane and try to plant trees by dropping Seedballs. At the end of the game, the players are congratulated for planting virtual trees and encouraged to turn them into real trees by donating Sh1 per tree.
"This is the first time that games are being used to address deforestation issues in Africa. The current climate change issues of drastic weather patterns, extinctions and drying water bodies' maybe a thing of the past if more people embrace this game especially the youth," said Jay Shapiro, Usiku Games.
The Taskforce Report on Forest Resources Management and Logging Activities in Kenya 2018 estimated that the forest sector contributes about Sh7 billion to the economy and employs over 50,000 people directly and another 300,000 indirectly.
